Gallery 847
Mythologies
(Part 2 of 3)
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Philosopher Roland Barthes
continues his discussion of the drama of Pro Wrestling. His theory
is that the moral lessons in the ring -- the exaggerated displays of Suffering,
Defeat, and Justice -- draw the viewers into the world of wrestling.
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In this section, he describes
how the "painful" holds, the acting out of brutality and suffering,
are designed to excite the passions of the audience...
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We are therefore dealing with
a real Human Comedy, where the most socially-inspired nuances of passion
(conceit, rightfulness, refined cruelty, a sense of 'paying one's debts')
always felicitously find the clearest sign which can receive them, express
them and triumphantly carry them to the confines of the hall.
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It is obvious that at such
a pitch, it no longer matters whether the passion is genuine or not. What
the public wants is the image of passion, not passion itself.
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There is no more a problem of truth
in wrestling than in the theater. In both, what is expected is the intelligible
representation of moral situations which are usually private.
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This emptying out of interiority
to the benefit of its exterior signs, this exhaustion of the content by
the form, is the very principle of triumphant classical art.
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Wrestling is an immediate pantomime,
infinitely more efficient than the dramatic pantomime, for the wrestler's
gesture needs no anecdote, no decor, in short no transference in order to
appear true.
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Each moment in wrestling is
therefore like an algebra which instantaneously unveils the relationship
between a cause and its represented effect. Wrestling fans certainly experience
a kind of intellectual pleasure in seeing the moral mechanism function so
perfectly.
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Some wrestlers, who are great
comedians, entertain as much as a Moliere character, because they succeed
in imposing an immediate reading of their inner nature.
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Armand Mazaud, a wrestler of
an arrogant and ridiculous character always delights the audience by the mathematical
rigor of his transcriptions, carrying the form of his gestures to the furthest
reaches of their meaning,,,
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... and giving to his manner
of fighting the kind of vehemence and precision found in a great scholastic
disputation, in which what is at stake is at once the triumph of pride
and the formal concern with truth.
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What is
thus displayed for the public is the great spectacle of Suffering, Defeat,
and Justice.
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Wrestling presents man's suffering
with all the amplification of tragic masks.
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The wrestler who suffers in
a hold which is reputedly cruel (an arm-lock, a twisted leg) offers an excessive
portrayal of Suffering;
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...like a primitive Pieta*,
he exhibits for all to see his face, exaggeratedly contorted
by an intolerable affliction.
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* [As far as I can tell, "Pieta"
means "pity" in Italian and refers to any image of Mary holding the
body of Jesus. The most famous Pieta is this sculpture by Michelangelo.]
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It is obvious, of course, that
in wrestling reserve would be out of place, since it is opposed to the voluntary
ostentation of the spectacle, to this Exhibition of Suffering which is the
very aim of the fight.
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This is
why all the actions which produce suffering are particularly spectacular,
like the gesture of a conjuror who holds out his cards clearly to the public.
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Suffering which appeared without
intelligible cause would not be understood; a concealed action that was
actually cruel would transgress the unwritten rules of wrestling and would
have no more sociological efficacy than a mad or parasitic gesture.
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On the contrary suffering appears
as inflicted with emphasis and conviction, for everyone must not only see
that the man suffers, but also and above all understand why he suffers.
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What wrestlers call a hold,
that is, any figure which allows one to immobilize the adversary indefinitely
and to have him at one's mercy...
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...has precisely the function
of preparing in a conventional, therefore intelligible, fashion the spectacle
of suffering, of methodically establishing the conditions of suffering.
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The inertia of the vanquished
allows the (temporary) victor to settle in his cruelty and to convey to
the public this terrifying slowness of the torturer who is certain about
the outcome of his actions.
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To grind the face of one's
powerless adversary...
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...or to scrape his spine with
one's fist with a deep and regular movement...
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...or at
least to produce the superficial appearance of such gestures: wrestling
is the only sport which gives such an externalized image of torture.
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But here again, only the image
is involved in the game, and the spectator does not wish for the actual
suffering of the contestant; he only enjoys the perfection of an iconography.
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It is not true that wrestling
is a sadistic spectacle: it is only an intelligible spectacle.
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There is another figure more
spectacular still than a hold; it is the forearm smash...
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... this loud slap of the
forearm, this embryonic punch with which one clouts the chest of one's adversary,
and which is accompanied by a dull noise and the exaggerated sagging of a
vanquished body.
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In the
forearm smash, catastrophe is brought to the point of maximum obviousness,
so much so that ultimately the gesture appears as no more than a symbol.
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This is going too far, this
is transgressing the moral rules of wrestling, where all signs must be
excessively clear, but must not let the intention of clarity be seen.
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The public then shouts 'He's
laying it on!', not because it regrets the absence of real suffering, but
because it condemns artifice: as in the theater, one fails to put the part
across as much by an excess of sincerity as by an excess of formalism.
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We have already seen to what
extent wrestlers exploit the resources of a given physical style, developed
and put to use in order to unfold before the eyes of the public a total image
of Defeat.
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The flaccidity of tall white
bodies which collapse with one blow or crash into the ropes with arms flailing,..
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...the inertia of massive wrestlers
rebounding pitiably off all the elastic surfaces of the ring,...
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...nothing can signify more
clearly and more passionately the exemplary abasement of the vanquished.
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Deprived of all resilience,
the wrestler's flesh is no longer anything but an unspeakable heap spread
out on the floor, where it solicits relentless reviling and jubilation.
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There is here a paroxysm of
meaning in the style of antiquity, which can only recall the heavily underlined
intentions in Roman triumphs.
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At other times, there is another
ancient posture which appears in the coupling of the wrestlers, that of the
suppliant who, at the mercy of his opponent, on bended knees, his arms raised
above his head, is slowly brought down by the vertical pressure of the victor.
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In wrestling, unlike judo,
Defeat is not a conventional sign, abandoned as soon as it is understood;
it is not an outcome, but quite the contrary, it is a duration, a display.
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It takes up the ancient myths
of public Suffering and Humiliation: the cross and the pillory.
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It is as if the wrestler is
crucified in broad daylight and in the sight of all.
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I have heard it said of a wrestler stretched on the ground: 'He
is dead, little Jesus, there, on the cross,' and these ironic words revealed
the hidden roots of a spectacle which enacts the exact gestures of the most
ancient purifications.
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But what wrestling is above
all meant to portray is a purely moral concept: that of justice.
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The idea of 'paying' is essential
to wrestling, and the crowd's 'Give it to him' means above all else 'Make
him pay'.
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This is therefore, needless
to say, an immanent justice. The baser the action of the 'bastard', the
more delighted the public is by the blow which he justly receives in return.
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If the villain--who is of course
a coward-- takes refuge behind the ropes, claiming unfairly to have a right
to do so by a brazen mimicry,
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...he is inexorably pursued
there and caught, and the crowd is jubilant at seeing the rules broken for
the sake of a deserved punishment.
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Wrestlers know very well how
to play up to the capacity for indignation of the public by presenting the
very limit of the concept of Justice,
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...this outermost zone of confrontation
where it is enough to infringe the rules a little more to open the gates
of a world without restraints.
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For a wrestling-fan, nothing
is finer than the revengeful fury of a betrayed fighter who throws himself
vehemently not on a successful opponent but on the smarting image of foul
play.
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Naturally, it is the pattern
of Justice which matters here, much more than its content: wrestling is above
all a quantitative sequence of compensations (an eye for an eye, a tooth for
a tooth).
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This explains why sudden changes
of circumstances have in the eyes of wrestling habitues a sort of moral beauty:
they enjoy them as they would enjoy an inspired episode in a novel,
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...and the greater the contrast
between the success of a move and the reversal of fortune, the nearer the
good luck of a contestant to his downfall, the more satisfying the dramatic
mime is felt to be.
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Justice is therefore the embodiment
of a possible transgression; it is from the fact that there is a Law that
the spectacle of the passions which infringe it derives its value.
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To be continued...
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